India remains on alert despite drastic drop in Covid cases
By Indira Guerrero
New Delhi, Aug 11 (EFE).- India has appeared to reverse its dramatic Covid-19 crisis, with daily cases dropping below 40,000 in recent days compared to caseloads of over 400,000 registered in May during the pandemic’s peak, but the authorities remain on alert over the possibility of another surge.
The current Covid figures are the lowest in recent months except for the southern state of Kerala, which has become the latest epicenter of the disease in the country and accounts for over half of the total cases in India right now.
According to health ministry data, on Wednesday India reported 38,353 fresh cases, including over 21,000 infections in Kerala.
The rest of the country points to a drastic recovery since the devastating second coronavirus wave in March and April, which led to hospitals and crematoriums running out of space due to the massive number of patients and deaths.
According to the government, India’s daily Covid caseload has not crossed 50,000 for the last 45 days.
New Delhi, one of the worst affected regions during the second wave, reported less than 60 cases, a sharp contrast to daily caseloads crossing 25,000 three months ago.
Similarly the western state of Maharashtra, which had registered over 60,000 daily cases in May, reported just around 5,000 cases in the last 24 hours.
The total number of Covid-19 cases in India has gone past 32 million, while 429,179 people have died of the disease so far.
Public health expert and epidemiologist Chandrakant Lahariya said that the official figures should not be seen as the only indication of the disease’s progress in India, as it could be related to the quality of the tests in the two states that have been reporting most of the cases.
